VOC's, Stains and you...

[John T 744]

VOC(Volatile Organic Compounds) are crippling stains and you woodies are the ones who need to keep producing excellent results for your customers.

Is this another green ploy to cause us wood restoration guys to be hit with environmental issues that may be over stated?

Years ago this Painter told me the best paints ever made were lead paints. They would last for years. Of course kids found this type of dried paint to be yummy and unfortunately extremely poisoness if not deadly.

What about stains and the VOC's? There here and there real.. But are the stains themselves the last few yrs also getting over regulated? Where does this end?

What's your thoughts and what have you done to find stains ahead of the curve?

[Jake Clark 17]

Hello John T,

I am glad you started this thread. It could beat the bleach police thread. The old formulas were 550 VOC, basicly meaning the stain was 66% solvent and 34% solids. NY's and fourteen other states' requirements are a minimum of 250 grams per liter or 75% solids and 25% solvent. If you paid $30.00 for the 34% product, after evaporation, you would be left with $10.20 of solids in your customers deck. With the 75% solids, 250 VOC product, after evaporation, the value to your customers deck is $22.50 per gallon.

Granted, some of the stain companies have had a tough go at making a stain with so little solvent and have some fairly thick products that are difficult to apply. Many others have thrown in the towel and are making water and oil formulas. The stain company you have used for years is one such company.

Please don't pre-judge failure of those that could not make the transition upon those of us who have. We tested our Mahogany Stain against Cabot's ATO 550VOC Mahogany Flame at 5500 ft in the Arizona mountains and proved that more solids and less evaporation, not only makes sense, but has superior performance. The tread is available for viewing here on TGS.

Shane of Bakers Gray Away and Peirce of Ready Seal, I am sure would agree,

Jake

[RPetry 564]

John,

Jake's synopsis above sounds about right. Most of the previous oil stain manufacturers have had a difficult time getting their products to penetrate due to restrictions on the amount of solvent permissible to conform with the restrictive VOC regulations. The result is poor product performance.

I will give a shout out to Ready Seal stains. As far as I know, due to their use of only paraffin oil, Ready Seal does not require a lot of solvent in their formula. Their stain was originally 250 VOC compliant before these regulations came into effect. They have not needed to re-engineer their product.

Now, if they would only go back to the plastic 5 gallon pails ...

[Beth n Rod 1,279]

Most oils are not anywhere near what they used to be. We used to LOVE CATO for example. Now we won't go near a pail. It's surprising where you will find your durability these days.....

Beth

[blizzy 28]

If you live in Toronto, you gotta look to the States, for your stuff.

Good oils............. VOC 250................. gone.

Nutin left but the sludge, and it got worse.

Or, water, go figure, seal a deck with water and latex, yea!!!!!!!!

15 years I been at this game and this year I gotta start over, cuz, I just could NOT put latex on decks.

So, my choice is A/C or R/S, got samples of both to put on my clear cedar.

Wife just loves that idea, Josephs jacket on the back deck, LOL

What survives in my kind of weather?

Brutal winters, with rapid temp. changes, from super bone chilling cold to light jacket and back in one day.

And summer, Hot and humid with almost daily thunder showers, depending on what side of the street you are on.

oh well.